Reader’s Question

I am the oldest girl out of four children, two boys and two girls. We are all very close in age (31, 30, 29, 27). My father is a manipulative, abusive, and controlling but “functioning” alcoholic. He has always held a job, but he is incredibly lazy at home and very old fashioned about his attitudes toward women. He has long held the attitude that men are superior to women and that we should forever be grateful for the sacrifices he made to put a roof over our heads and food on the table — even though we grew up on hand-me-downs and weren’t allowed to do things like sports or anything that would cost him any money.

My father is also addicted to porn and has an obscene mouth. He is very inappropriate in almost any social setting. My mother is a wonderful sweetheart and the queen of all “enablers.” My sister and I were not allowed to date nor even encouraged to socialize. We “rebelled” when out of high school by being wild and partying a lot, and we both were fairly promiscuous. My brothers on the other hand were were always encouraged to “get some” and have never had healthy relationships. They seem to lack self-esteem with women as well as in general. Both of my brothers drink a lot in order to loosen up and have fun and be talkative. It is like they don’t think they are good enough when they are sober. My older brother especially has poor self-esteem and has had problems abusing drugs and prescription pain pills. He has even attempted suicide. He has just remarried and seems to be a lot happier, so I hope things work out for him.

I have had my times in the past with drinking, but I am a grown woman now, with a wonderful husband and two beautiful daughters. I have no need to drink to make myself feel better. My sister went the other way and has huge “daddy issues” and married a possessive, controlling, manipulative jerk and claims that she “married our father”. There are times that I think she is unhappy and other times that I think she loves and feeds on the drama. Dad alternates between standing up for her husband and saying that he needs a whipping. My youngest brother has not quite grown up and still lives like he is 21 and didn’t even move out of my parent’s house until he was 25.

Now you have some background on our dysfunctional family. All four children have come up with different methods of coping. But I am the most vocal about standing up to my father and not accepting his behavior. I am also the only child who has not depended on him financially. I am very responsible, and my husband and I have worked hard to establish great credit and build our future. We want to have a nice home and provide our children with wonderful opportunities and experiences in this life. As a result, we have been labeled “stuck up”.

I don’t think of myself as better than the others. I have engaged in plenty of self-sabotage in the past. I took up smoking at 18 to be more accepted by my siblings and did all sorts of reckless things. But since I’ve quit and changed other things in my life, we have little in common. They don’t feel comfortable at our home because we don’t allow smoking. And because I enjoy working out and take care with my appearance, I’m called “selfish”. I have been around my family several times in the last month and have had the experience of drinking more than I intended and bumming a cigarette too, all because I felt the need to fit in and be accepted.

Could you please offer me some insight as to why it’s still important to fit in with my family when I don’t actually want to? I am also at a loss. I don’t really want to associate with my father. He has progressively become more bitter, negative and obscene. But I want a relationship with the rest and to feel accepted by them.

Our Clinical Psychologist’s Reply

Sometimes it’s hard to separate our natural feelings of belongingness and desire for an emotional bond with family members from our concerns over their behavior patterns. It’s perfectly natural for you to feel like you belong. And it’s also not uncommon for the bond between siblings to be stronger than even the bond between parent and child. That doesn’t mean you need to endorse dysfunctional behavior, however. Somehow you overcame your need for your father’s approval, most likely because you neither respected him nor valued his conditional endorsement. But you want your siblings to accept you. If you wish to maintain your personal integrity, you’ll have to refrain from doing the things you realize are self-destructive when you’re with them, even if they’re doing them or want you to join in. If they cast you as “stuck-up,” you’ll simply need to reassure them that you’re not passing judgment on them but rather on yourself and your inability to function in the reckless ways you have in the past. Stand up. Take responsibility. Don’t blame them. Take care of yourself. When they blame you, it’s likely a defense against feeling badly about themselves.